The following is a summary of “Correlation of idiopathic benign paroxysmal positional vertigo with cerebral small vessel disease,” published in the December 2023 issue of Emergency Medicine by Yu, et al.

Benign paroxysmal positional vertigo (BPPV) is the most common type of peripheral vertigo. One of the possible reasons for this condition is vascular tumors. BPPV is most likely to happen to older people. If, on the other hand, small blood vessels in the brain get damaged, you might have cerebrovascular small vessel disease (CSVD). Vascular involvement caused by age-related risk factors and a state of chronic inflammation may be what connects BPPV and CSVD.

For a study, researchers sought to find out if there is a possible link between BPPV and CSVD by looking at people aged 50 and up who have BPPV and seeing if they also have a higher rate of CSVD. People with BPPV aged 50 and up who had already been identified were included in this historical study. There was also a comparison group made up of people who were diagnosed with idiopathic facial neuritis (IFN) around the same time. The Fazekas scale was used to measure the load of white matter hyperintensities (WMHs) in the brain. A logistic regression analysis was done to determine whether there was a link between BPPV and WMHs.

101 people with BPPV and 116 with IFN were in the study. It was found that patients with BPPV were much more likely than the control group to have a higher Fazekas score (OR = 2.37, 95% CI 1.40–4.03, P = 0.001). There was a 9.9 (95% CI 4.21–24.84, P<0.001) odds ratio for white matter hyperplasia on MRI in people who had a brain injury, 2.86 (95% CI 1.67–5.0, P<0.001) for people with high blood pressure, and 1.18 (95% CI 1.13–1.22, P<0.001) for older people. The results showed that vascular damage from age-related risk factors and a high inflammation state may play a part in the development of BPPV in people aged 50 and up since they saw a link between the pain of BPPV and the intensity of WMHs.

Source: sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S073567572300520X